


Easy

by whetstone



Category: Big Bang (Band)
Genre: Character Death, Gen, Illness, gen - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-20
Updated: 2013-04-20
Packaged: 2017-12-08 23:17:23
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/767237
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whetstone/pseuds/whetstone
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Things that come easy, even when you expect them not to. Youngbae-centric.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Easy

Jiyong is slumped against the door to a room he’s never been locked out of before. He can’t hear anything going on inside, no crying or things being thrown or music being blared and the silence has fear blossoming into the heaving cavity of his chest, the slim column of his throat. He can feel eyes on him, knows without turning around that Seunghyun and Daesung and Seungri are somewhere behind him but he just sits cross-legged on the floor with his hood over his hair.

“Youngbae,” he says, “just open the goddamned door.”

\---

Youngbae doesn’t come down for lunch but he does for dinner. His face is calm even though four other men are staring at it intently, and he’s the only one to clean his plate, the steel of his chopsticks flashing with each deft scoop of rice. He even does the dishes afterwards.

Jiyong finds him elbow-deep in soapy water, hat pulled down low over his eyes, shirt flecked with dark spots of moisture. “Hey,” he starts, but Youngbae just shakes his head. He’s holding a tall glass and scrubbing it with the sponge and he flashes Jiyong a smile, the same smile he’s had since he was a skinny runt of a twelve year old, all big eyes and floppy hair and awkward limbs. Jiyong doesn’t know what to do, doesn’t know how he can be so _Youngbae_ , even now, so he wraps his arms around him over the sink, rests his chin on his shoulder as Youngbae chides him about wet clothes and the immobility of his arms.

\---

Youngbae’s mother comes over after the appointment with a trunkful of groceries. She deposits her son on the couch and takes over the kitchen, filling the apartment with all sorts of delectable, homey smells that get Seunghyun’s stomach rumbling. He emerges from his bedroom, sits and watches television with Youngbae, ignoring the insistent vibrations of his cell phone and the schedule crumpled up in his pocket. In the middle of a game show he falls asleep, but wakes up just in time for dinner, head pillowed against Youngbae’s shoulder. He sits up and rubs at the coin-sized spot of drool and apologizes once, twice, three times, and Youngbae just smacks him on the thigh and tells him to shut up and set the table.

The stew is delicious, filled to the brim with cuts of meat and kimchi and vegetables and Youngbae’s mother asks all sorts of questions, plugs up the silence with her bright, determined voice. She packs about three weeks worth of food into the freezer and presses a parcel of medicine and vitamins into Seunghyun’s hands before she leaves. “Please make sure he takes these,” she says, so Seunghyun begins waking up every three hours and organizing pills into little plastic canisters according to the day.  

“I can do this myself,” Youngbae says, watching Seunghyun’s hand wobble around the glass of water, but Seunghyun just shakes his head, places the multicolored tabs into his hand with papery fingers and settles back to watch him take each one.

\---

Daesung is cutting up fruit for a salad when Youngbae meanders in. He starts and almost drops the knife: it clatters against the counter, shiny and stained with watermelon flesh. “Do you want me to make you some?”

“I’m fine,” he says, moving around him to get to the fridge. “You look good.”

Daesung glances down at himself, at the toned slant of his arms, the flatness of his stomach. “Thanks,” he says, because he’d never been able to look like his hyung, who was all bright smiles over twined muscles, his hyung who was looking skinner than he ever had, whose baseball caps had to fit backwards since they flopped over his face when he tried to wear them normally now. “I’m going to the gym,” he blurts out, because he remembers when he and Youngbae tried to see who could do the most reps, when they spotted each other over the weight machines and counted each other’s push-ups, he remembers it like it was yesterday because it was and now he goes alone and Youngbae just putters from room to room aimlessly, cleaning out the empty pantry and sorting through the mail.

“Have fun,” Youngbae says, even as _I’m sorry_ begins forming on Daesung’s lips.

“My dad is praying for you,” he says instead, and Youngbae’s eyes dim for a second, his mouth tightening and loosening again before he nods.

“Tell him I said thanks,” he says. “I’ll pray for him too.”

 

Daesung goes twenty minutes on the treadmill before curling up in the corner of the YG gym with his headphones and his iPod. He doesn’t move for the next hour.

\---

When Youngbae becomes too tired to hang around the hostel, they bring him to the hospital. He’s installed in his own room, with lace curtains and baby blue wallpaper and navy blue sheets, and he jokes to Seungri that he feels like a newborn, gesturing to the runner printed with sailboats that fits above the window. Seungri laughs, eyes cast towards the boxed lunch he’s brought, counting the plaid stripes of the covering instead of the tubes that go down and into Youngbae’s veins. He talks and talks and talks, brags about the latest celebrity he’s gotten a phone number from as he sets the kimbap and bulgogi on top of the tiny bedside table, opens the containers of rice and sets the chopsticks down on printed plastic holders.

“I rolled it myself,” Seungri says, spearing a piece of kimbap and fitting it into his mouth. It tastes like straw and sticky cardboard, so he tongues it into one of his cheeks instead of chewing.

“You mean your girlfriend did,” Youngbae corrects. Seungri grins and swallows. His spit tastes of seaweed and pickled radish and carrots and the food-lump is still there, but so is Youngbae’s smile, as bright and big and genuine as he remembers. He finishes his food and when he wipes his hands he swishes them against each other, _crack crack crack crack_ , just to hear the incredulous laughter work its way out of Youngbae’s wasted chest. He pretends Youngbae is just sick with swine flu or regular flu or something else that needs bed rest, that he just needs more food or more laughter or more ridiculous stories, things Seungri can provide, and it carries him through the dizzying array of variety shows he’s signed himself up for, alone.

\---

One day Jiyong comes in with a gym bag slung over one shoulder. Youngbae doesn’t ask questions, only holds the lever that lifts the bed until he’s in a sitting position, and watches him set a nest of wires next to the television. Jiyong stays quiet as he untangles the cords and plugs things in and then he’s handing Youngbae a controller, settling down at the end of the bed. “Playstation One?” He asks, turning over the battered grey plastic. _Kwon Jiyong_ , it reads in faded black marker. The characters are blocky and childlike, like the ones on the screen.

“You never finished your file,” Jiyong says. “You’re only on the first disc.” Youngbae watches the screen load until the screen is filled with colors that make his eyes open wide. “Golden Saucer. Get to it.”

\---

“You suck at this,” Youngbae says, coughing even as he laughs. Jiyong pauses the game to wipe his mouth with his handkerchief, putting the mucus-stained fabric back into his own shirt pocket. Youngbae can’t really concentrate on complex fighting strategies or materia combinations anymore, so Jiyong’s decided he’s going to finish for him. Seunghyun is somewhere in the bowels of the hospital getting them coffee, and Seungri is outside with Teddy and Bom. Jiyong guides Cloud through a ruined cityscape. During the second random battle, he uses his last Hi-Potion and watches helplessly as the other two members of his party are killed. “Use the Phoenix Down,” Youngbae says, finally.

“I don’t have anymore,” Jiyong says, flicking through his inventory. They watch Cloud’s health go down to zero in silence. The game over screen flickers on, accompanied by the requisite tinkling piano.

“I wonder if it’s going to be that simple,” Youngbae says. He has a bit of the blanket in his hand, rubbing at the cotton with his now-skinny fingers. “Just poof, and you’re gone.”

Jiyong shakes his head, wets his lips with the tip of his tongue and jabs his thumb into the x button so it restarts the game. “I just have to start over. I’ll beat it this time.”

“I won’t,” Youngbae says, and Jiyong lets the controller fall into the sheets. He crawls up the bed and twines himself around Youngbae, ignoring the foreign smell of antiseptic hospital soap and the IV drips that thump against his spine when Youngbae gets an arm around his back.

“You’re too good for this,” he says. When he squeezes he can feel every bone under the gown and it makes him angry. “You’re too good, you don’t deserve this,” he spits, pulling at the fabric. “You don’t...” Jiyong stops, then, and slowly unravels in his best friend’s arms, his words messing themselves into incoherent hiccups and sniffles and sobs. He tries to turn away, but the movement pulls at the drips and he stills, dribbling snot into Youngbae’s armpit.

“Jiyong,” Youngbae says, “Jiyongie, don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine.”

\---

When it happens, it slips into the room like a well-known friend, past Daesung in the chair snoozing, past Seunghyun and Jiyong with elbows on the windowpane and heads towards the sky, past Seungri watching an infomercial on mute. It hangs down beside Youngbae and his breathing slows down to a metronome click on its lowest setting, deep and measured and then it's gone, dissolved into the cool, clean air.

Easy.


End file.
